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Book Review: Broken At Love

When a knee injury ends twenty-year-old Quinn Rowland’s pro tennis career, he’s not only dumped by his hot Russian girlfriend but ordered to attend college by his disinterested billionaire father. A rich kid who’s not used to being disappointed by life, Quinn and his sociopathic half-brother Sebastian create a frat house game intended to treat girls how they see them—as simple game pieces to be manipulated for their pleasure.

College sophomore Emilie Swanson knows Quinn’s reputation—after all, he did send one of her sorority sisters into therapy earlier in the semester—but the game and his charm bring them closer together and soon she starts to believe there’s more to Quinn than people think.

But what if the more is something darker than a game of toying with emotions and breaking hearts?

Quinn and Emilie might be falling for each other, but there are secrets he’s not ready to tell—and lifestyle changes he’s reluctant to make. She willingly stepped on the court, but if Emilie finds out she started out as nothing as a pawn in Quinn and Sebastian’s twisted game, she might never forgive him.

To his surprise, Quinn finds that he might finally care about someone more than he cares about himself…even if that means letting Emilie walk away for good.

I received Broken at Love by Lyla Payne as part of the blog tour (post coming tomorrow, Monday 22nd). I was intrigued by the ‘frat house game’ described in the synopsis. We do not have ‘frats’ here in the UK, so it is an area I know very little about. And indeed, I really enjoyed the first half of the book. Emilie is different from the other girls, so when Quinn is given a bet that he can’t seduce her, he has to pull out all the stops. In the beginning Emilie is presented as quite a strong, not afraid to be different girl. When Quinn pulls his trick to get girls into bed, Emilie doesn’t fall for it. At this point I am rooting for her, and I was really intrigued by the story and where it was going to go.

Unfortunately it kinda peaked too early for me. I was expecting some epic revenge which didn’t really happen. Emilie was so un-loyal to her friends, and she kind of lost all the respect I had for her. She turned into yet another girl falling at the feet of men, and it angered me. She started out really strong, and both her and Quinn had really good background stories; you can tell that the author had put a lot of thought into them as people, as opposed to just characters in books.

Parts of the main character were just frustrating though. I mean, yes players can be people too, but did she not stop to think what diseases he could be carrying? Eww. This is one of the constant problems with society; everybody knows they should be taking precautions, but unless it is shown in books, movies and tv shows, the message just isn’t going to get across. I don’t know what the frat community is really like, but this books just gave such an icky feel to society. A game where boys bet who the player can seduce? Not cool. I know this is what attracted me to the book, but the guys never really got any punishment for it, and the game probably continued.

However, if you enjoy steamy romance, and girl falls for boy NA stories, then this is definitely for you. Or just read the first half, which is funny and sexy.